boraxalumni.com

You have jostled me to tell a story.  It's about my first job at Pacific Coast Borax Company. I was a skinny 15 year old, and I think the job was to keep me out of trouble, (like shooting the lights out at the ball park, making firecrackers from jettisoned machine gun shells and a few inches of fuse).  The powers that be also gave me a bounty on all the feral cats I killed. My dog at the time was a true hunter, a female Doxie named Lulu. 
 
But I digress, Charlie Cole was the head cook, who loved the ponies and every holiday he was off to Santa Anita for his vacation.  Charlie was reputed to be an excellent handicapper, but he always came back to work.  Jim Hines was #2. He was a great fat man who's nickname was Tiny.  My favorite meal they cooked was "Pot Roast" and favorite dessert, sugar cookies.
 
They had an ice house on the north end of the mess hall where great blocks of ice froze in a swirling bath of brine. Beyond the ice house was an underground cool house to store food. To the west across the Railroad tracks was the cook’s cabin. South of that was my home with Bob Blum the civil engineer, then Gus Johnson the head blaster and his Wife Julia.  Bob was deaf from too many blasts. Then was the Corkill home. Pete Grim was next with my best buddy Freddy Grim.  Last was Osborn, who married the nurse Grace. On the east side of the tracks was the Rec Hall where they had games of pool, Poker, Pangini, and pinochle.  Draft beer was served and movies and dances were held. I worked for a short time as the projectionist (I remember showing
”The Outlaw” with Jane Russell about 1944).  I learned all the card games by kibitzing my parents.  One night they were holding a pinochle tourney.  They were short one person at one of the 15 or so tables, so they let me play!  I came in second and the next week I won!  The last night I came in high enough to win the whole tournament! Jack Garzet, Collins, Blum.

I enjoyed reading Cody Williams  message and I am sure his thoughts bring back memories for many former Borax employees.  I was at the open pit mine when it opened, but I don’t think I have met Cody.  I enjoyed my times at Borax and Death Valley and its history--Harmony,  Ryan, Furnace Creek and the open pit mining at Boron.   Thank you for all your work. 

~Wendell

"(I) Didn't realize Stephen Mather was a Borax executive at one time and that it was he who came up with the 20 mule team trademark. In one conversation I had with Horace Albright, if memory serves correctly, it was really Horace that was responsible for the NPS coming into being. He let Stephen be the first director, as he [Horace] didn't want to be--he preferred to work behind the scenes. He could accomplish a lot more that way.

I was very fortunate, when I went back east in the fall of 1949 to meet my Dad in New York, to get a tour of all the historical places around Washington from Horace Albright. We even saw his office--it was tiny, as I recall. He took us on a tour of the capitol, all the Washington monuments, the Smithsonian aerospace museum, Mt Vernon, Monticello, Gettysburg, Williamsburg etc. A real whirlwind tour. No I didn't climb the stairs up the Washington monument!"

~Jim Gerstley Jr.

(photo courtesy of the National Parks Service)

"Both Stephen Mather and Horace Albright were dedicated salesmen of the national park idea.  A cynic might even say that Mather promoted National Parks just like he promoted 20 Mule Team Borax.  An endowed, annual lecture series is named after him.  I had an opportunity to meet him one time, but at the last moment was unable to attend.

Until I read George Hildebrand's biography of my grandfather, Francis Marion Smith, I was completely unaware of the connection with the Mather family.  My grandfather first hired Stephen Mather's father, Joseph, to open and operate a New York City office for Pacific Coast Borax.  Later, when the two agreed an office was needed in Chicago, my grandfather accepted the suggestion to put Stephen Mather in charge.  It's my understanding that at the time Stephen Mather suggested marketing company products as 20 Mule Team Borax, my grandfather was initially reluctant, since he was using his own name in the marketing campaign.  Fortunately, for both of them, he reconsidered and the rest is history.

That's a great photo you included; the license plate was undoubtedly one of the more subtle marketing efforts of the first two national park directors."

~Steve Beck

Cody got it partly right that “The name’s of Borax employees are scattered all over this Mojave Desert and Death Valley’s canyons…” – in fact, some of them have left their “remains” in the little Ryan cemetery.  It’s a forgotten little spot and every time I am there I can’t help but feel reverence for those unknown people who now grace this little patch of wilderness in their repose.  True pioneers of the Borax saga in DV.